Posts Tagged ‘Nir Barkat’

Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat put his body on the line Sunday morning, separating a fight while cycling from home to work.

On his way to City Hall at Safra Square, Barkat stopped to separate two men brawling in the middle of the road. The men appeared to have been involved in a traffic accident.

Not pausing for a moment, the mayor single-handedly intervened, stopping the fight. He then called the police and paramedics, staying at the scene until the authorities arrived.

The former hi-tech entrepreneur is no stranger to conflict. Barkat served as a paratrooper in the IDF, retiring with the rank of Major. He was injured in combat, after leading his soldiers into battle on the frontlines of the First Lebanon War.

Serving as the mayor of Israel’s capital since 2008, Barkat is also known to jump into harm’s way to protect the wellbeing of his city’s residents.

In 2004, Barkat saved the life of a number of passengers, including a 16-year old girl, after running into a smoldering bus in the aftermath of a Palestinian suicide bomb attack.

Earlier this year, the 55-year-old happened to be on-hand after a stabbing attack near City Hall, where a Palestinian youth attacked an ultra-Orthodox Jew.

Once again demonstrating his hero credentials, Barkat tackled the terrorist to the ground, before treating the victim and even helping police direct traffic.

The report made headlines worldwide, earning the mayor favorable comparisons to Batman, among other vigilante heroes.

An unknown American Jewish millionaire has made an offer to buy the debt-ridden Beitar Jerusalem Soccer club, the One sports website reported Sunday.

Jerusalem Major Nir Barkat has been searching for a buyer because the club’s owner Eli Tabib is not committed to retaining ownership.

Tabib, who recently was lightly wounded outside his posh home near Tel Aviv, is studying the offer from the American to determine if it will cover his investment of more than $4 million plus more than $5 million in debts.

Final steps are underway for building the City of David’s “Kedem” visitor’s center in Jerusalem that will sit on top of the “Givati Parking Lot” excavation just outside of the Old City of Jerusalem’s walls. The visitor’s center will serve as an entryway to the Jerusalem Walls National Park, which includes the City of David and Mount Zion, as well as to the Old City’s Ophel and Hulda Gates.

Several Arab and left-wing activist groups have criticized the project for its location in the predominately Arab eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan and for interfering with the skyline of the Old City.

Many public officials and archaeologists including — Harvard University professor of design Carl Steinitz, Nobel Laureate Yisrael Aumann and renowned archaeologist Dr. Gabriel Barkay—have spoken out in favor of the project.

The structure will sit approximately 21 feet below the Old City walls so that it will not affect the iconic Jerusalem skyline, according to the City of David.

“The City’s goal is to lay down the infrastructure to accommodate about 10 million visitors a year,” Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said in a statement.

In slightly over a month, at least one million Jews will mark a horrifying event that became the straw that broke the camel’s back in Israel, igniting another war on terror in Gaza.

June 3 corresponds with the date on the Hebrew calendar that marks the abduction of Eyal Yifrach, 19, Naftali Frenkel, 16, and Gilad Sha’ar, 16.

The event is being organized by the families of the three boys, together with Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat and the Gesher organization.

The three families also recently celebrated the launching of the Jerusalem Unity Prize, to be awarded for the first time on June 3 as well.

Together with the Jerusalem municipality, Gesher and Israel President Reuven Rivlin, the three families celebrated the launch of the Jerusalem Unity Prize several months ago. It is intended to commemorate and further the Jewish unity that was seen when the entire nation of Israel came together to pray and help search for the missing boys.

The three boys were kidnapped on June 12 by Hamas terrorists while hitchiking home from yeshiva in Gush Etzion on a Thursday evening. They were murdered in cold blood shortly after they were grabbed; a shooting that was heard on a recording made by Israel Police when one of them managed to dial the emergency dispatcher in a desperate cry for help.

It took nearly three weeks for search and rescue teams and volunteers to locate their bodies in a shallow grave, hastily dug in a field in Halhul. During that time, Jews in Israel and around the world came together in an unprecedented show of unity to pray, demonstrate and otherwise show their support for the families and other Jews.

Police and Border Police Monday morning captured the suspect in Saturday night’s hit-and-run terrorist attack that wounded four police officers, including a 20-year-old woman, with light to moderate injuries.

He is about 30 years old and is from the Shuafat neighborhood in northern Jerusalem.

The attack in eastern Jerusalem capped off a day of terror that spread from Ma’aleh Adumim to the capital.

The hit-and-run terrorist was driving his Skoda car from the area of the Mount of Olives (Har HaZeitim) when he saw a group of policemen on the sidewalk. The driver drove over the curb, hit the victims and escaped as police shot at the vehicle, which later was found abandoned.

Other Arabs joined the culture of violence by throwing rocks at rescue vehicle and at the car of Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat, who arrived at the scene. He was not injured, but his car sustained light damage, as did the motorcycle of a volunteer rescue worker.

Earlier in the day, approximately two dozen Arabs were injured by police trying to disperse riots in Jerusalem’s A-Tur neighborhood, which the past several months has been a hotbed of terrorist activity.

The riots followed two stabbing attacks by Jerusalem and Palestinian Authority terrorists. Police killed a terrorist, reportedly 17 years old, near Maaleh Adumim after he stabbed a Border Police officer in the neck. He is being treated in the hospital for light to moderate wounds.

The family of the attacker claimed that the terrorist really was not a terrorist and did not attack police, who they said “executed” him.

A state of mourning was called in A-Tur, and a general strike left schools and institutions closed.

Continuing widespread violence in eastern Jerusalem has included more rock-throwing attacks on the city’s light rail system. Violence is fueled by terrorist cells and also by Palestinian Authority media that repeatedly describe Arab attackers as innocents.

WAFA, the official Palestinian Authority news site, reported Sunday that Mohammed abu Ghannam, the father of the 17-year-old killed in the incident near Maaleh Adumim, “expressed his belief that the Israeli version of such incidents is intended to acquit Israeli soldiers and whitewash their crimes.”

The father said, “One who attempts to stab soldiers doesn’t wield a large knife and start running toward armed soldiers.”

He did not offer a different method of how terrorists attack with a knife.